A Tale Of Two Civies

(UK) Lisa Greenwood did a silly thing, she used her civil service e-mail account in which to send this e-mail to the British MP Hazel Blears.

Subject line: LIAR.
You and your honourable members are all liars and thieves. I was appalled to see you on national television this morning waving a cheque around as if it was going to make everything OK. You are not sorry at all. (Only sorry that you have been caught.) You are a disgrace. Why haven't you been arrested and why have you not been sacked? Not that my comments will have any impact. I doubt you will even read this."

The reason Mrs Greenwood felt the urge to send an e-mail to the right dishonourable Blears was because Miss Blears had gone on TV in which to express her innocence at getting caught with her fingers in the till.

That e-mail was sent at lunchtime. By 7 that evening, Mrs Greenwood had been suspended and then, after a hearing, she was sacked.

Azad Ali is another British civil servant. In fact, he works as the head of IT at the British treasury. Not only that but he wears these other hats as well:

• Sits on the board of London CrimeStoppers
• Sits on the Metropolitan Police’s Strategic Stop & Search Committee and Police Use of Firearms Group
• A member of the Independent Police Complaints Commission’s Community Advisory Group
• A member of the Home Office’s Trust and Confidence Community Panel
• He is a trustee of the East London Mosque & London Muslim Centre
• He chairs the Muslim Council of Britain’s membership committee and is a member of its central working committee
• He is the vice-chairman of Canon Barnet School board of governors
• He is also the President of the Civil Service Islamic Society

And he too, like Mrs Greenwood, felt the need to speak out against this government, but rather than call an MP a lirr and a disgrace, Mr Ali stated that he would have no problem killing a British soldier in Iraq:

‘If I saw an American or British man wearing a soldier’s uniform inside Iraq I would kill him because that is my obligation. 'If I found the same soldier in Jordan I wouldn’t touch him. In Iraq he is a fighter and an occupier, here he is not. I respect this as the main instruction in my religion for jihad.’

Well, it seems that Mr Ali lives a charmed life. You see, not only was he suspended on full pay, he has been allowed to return to work, no questions asked, at the British Treasury.

Now, if only Mrs Greenwood had been a Muslim...